Shooters often use shooting bags to support a firearm during target practice and accuracy testing. For example, shooters can place the forestock of a rifle on a front bag and the buttstock of the rifle on a rear bag. The front bag is typically larger than the rear bag and can include an arcuate or V-shaped top surface sized to support the forestock of the rifle. The rear bag may include an arcuate or V-shaped surface sized to support the buttstock of the rifle. Other shooting bags are sized to support the entire rifle so that a second bag is not needed. For example, one such shooting bag includes a long U- or V-shaped opening sized to receive several inches of a rifle stock to support the entire rifle. Additional shooting bags have different shapes designed for other applications.
Conventional shooting bags include (a) a fabric or leather cover that encloses an internal cavity, and (b) particulate material filling the entire internal cavity. One drawback of conventional shooting bags is that the bottom portion of each bag tends to round such that the bottom surface of the bag is not planar, but rather slopes upwardly from a central portion of the bottom surface toward a perimeter portion of the bottom surface. As a result, the edges between the bottom surface and the side surfaces are typically spaced apart from the external support surface on which the bag rests. The rounding of the bottom portion of the bag creates instability and enables the bag to shift or move relatively easily under the weight of the firearm. The instability of conventional shooting bags can adversely affect the accuracy and concentration of a shooter. Another drawback of conventional shooting bags is that the bags are expensive to ship. Specifically, the entire internal cavity of the shooting bag must be filled with particulate material to provide the desired shape to the bag. The particulate material is heavy and shipping rates are based in part on the weight of a package. Accordingly, there exists a need to improve conventional shooting bags.